Reviews tagging 'Religious bigotry'

The Devil and the Dark Water by Stuart Turton

10 reviews

cmbohn's review

adventurous challenging dark emotional mysterious tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.25

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Violence and Fire/Fire injury

Moderate: Torture, Injury/Injury detail, Infidelity, Religious bigotry, Gun violence, Murder, and Sexual content

Minor: War, Death of parent, Sexual violence, and Pregnancy

aklovekorn's review against another edition

adventurous mysterious tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? It's complicated
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Infidelity, Injury/Injury detail, Blood, Death, Violence, Animal death, Kidnapping, Religious bigotry, Fire/Fire injury, Confinement, Classism, Grief, Misogyny, and Murder

rochelleisreading's review

informative mysterious medium-paced

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Violence, Rape, Misogyny, War, Fire/Fire injury, Sexism, Blood, Animal death, Toxic relationship, Torture, Slavery, and Religious bigotry

Moderate: Injury/Injury detail, Drug use, Classism, Death of parent, Confinement, Death, Murder, and Colonisation

Minor: Physical abuse and Alcohol

heini's review against another edition

adventurous mysterious fast-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? N/A
• Loveable characters? N/A
• Diverse cast of characters? N/A
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Colonisation, Violence, Sexual violence, Confinement, Domestic abuse, Blood, Emotional abuse, Genocide, Physical abuse, and Misogyny

Moderate: Fire/Fire injury

Minor: Animal cruelty, Excrement, Rape, War, and Religious bigotry

paperquilt's review

adventurous dark mysterious tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Colonisation, Toxic relationship, Violence, Animal death, Medical content, Death, Gaslighting, Blood, Fire/Fire injury, Gore, Injury/Injury detail, Misogyny, and Murder

Moderate: Religious bigotry and Domestic abuse

amiegold's review

adventurous challenging dark mysterious medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Plot
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? No

5.0

In The Devil and the Dark Water, we are treated to a Sherlock Holmes, locked-room mystery that has been turned on it's head.  After Sammy Pipps, a talented investigator, is imprisoned on a ship, his friend and body guard, Arent, accompanies him on a journey full of mystery, murder and intrigue.  As Sammy is a prisoner, Arent finds himself with the unfamiliar responsibility of solving the mystery before it is too late.  The plot twists kept me on my toes, as I was unsure if there was a supernatural element to the mystery or not.  I enjoyed this book, the ending and the characters. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Blood

Moderate: Vomit and Religious bigotry

mrslsmith's review against another edition

adventurous dark informative mysterious tense medium-paced

4.75

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Content Warnings

Minor: Blood, Rape, Colonisation, Excrement, Religious bigotry, Vomit, Animal death, Injury/Injury detail, Murder, Domestic abuse, Torture, and Gore

diana_raquel's review against another edition

adventurous dark mysterious tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

"Cleverness is a type of strength, and they won't accept a woman who's stronger than they are. Their pride won't allow it, and their pride is the thing they hold dearest."

 Mystery thrillers are not my cup of tea. My reading tastes tend to be directed toward classics, fantasy, and contemporary. However, I loved the previous book of Turton.

After The Seven Deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle, I had an idea of what I would find in this book: a murder mystery full of details that wouldn't make sense until the final chapter, with an influence of speculative fiction.  Well, I didn't get my speculative fiction influence. And that's okay. What I got was so much better. What I got was a murder mystery (somewhat) historical full of details that only made sense in the final chapters. 

This was a really good book, with a solid structure. The characters were well developed and you never really know what they're thinking and what they might do next, which only made the narrative more compelling. And, as usual, my theories were all wrong, but then only made the narrative more interesting. 

I think that the only thing that I wasn't a fan of was the pacing in the early chapters. They seem to be dragging and dragging. I understand the need to set the scene and the characters in a murder mystery but I think that this part could be done in fewer stages/pages.

Overall, I liked it and recommend it to murder mysteries lovers!

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Misogyny, Murder, Sexism, Violence, Animal death, Death, Gore, and Blood

Moderate: Racism, Religious bigotry, Domestic abuse, and Toxic relationship

Minor: Rape, Slavery, and Infidelity

horationelson's review against another edition

mysterious slow-paced

• Diverse cast of characters? No

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Blood, Injury/Injury detail, Misogyny, and Violence

Moderate: Classism, Animal death, Domestic abuse, and Gore

Minor: Body horror, Colonisation, Confinement, and Religious bigotry

maiagaia's review against another edition

mysterious tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Plot
• Strong character development? It's complicated
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

2.25

Like The 7 1/2 Deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle, this book has extremely engaging, compulsively readable prose. I tore through both in only a few days despite their length. The issue is that both have really bad endings. Like book-ruining bad.
The Devil and the Dark Water commits what is, to me, a cardinal sin: a POV character lied to the reader with their own thoughts.

Creesjie is the POV character when she finds the governor general's body. She panics and cries and is frightened in the dark. We find out later that she planned the whole thing and planted a fake murder weapon in the middle of that scene. But we don't see it because it would ruin the mystery. And that's the only reason. It makes zero sense.

There are also multiple instances of chapters ending with a random description of something that the character didn't see. These chapters are written in 3rd person limited, so the random omnipotence is clunky.
The reveal of the twist was bad enough , but the final scene was the expired whipped cream on this shit sundae. We have two well-developed, stubborn characters who do a total about face in the last five pages.

Arent and Sara are both set up as having strict, particular views on morality, yet at the end, they are suddenly willing to look past the hundreds of deaths Creesjie and Pipps caused??? I could maybe buy it if given more time, but 5 pages is NOT enough.

 
At this point, I'm not sure I'll be reading from this author again. He has a wonderful writing style, but the endings are just unforgivable.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Emotional abuse and Violence

Moderate: Genocide, Sexism, and Religious bigotry

Minor: War, Vomit, Slavery, Child death, Colonisation, and Confinement